Interesting speculations, but that's not how these environmental monitoring satellites work. They are set up to get global coverage with this instrument every 5 days. The orbit is chosen so that this happens, to enable long-term time series of vegetation, land cover, etc., as you note.
It's a successor to other satellites like SPOT, and a competitor/complement to NASA satellites like MODIS.
It's a successor to other satellites like SPOT, and a competitor/complement to NASA satellites like MODIS.